Gunmen killed nine foreign tourists and their Pakistani guide in Gilgit-Baltistan on Sunday, the security officials have said.
The breaded armed men stormed into a hotel near the foot Nanga Parbat, one of world’s tallest mountains, in the midnight of Saturday and Sunday and opened fire on the tourists, police said.
The dead tourists include five Ukrainians, three Chinese and Russian. One Chinese is said to have survived in the attack.
8,125-meter snow-covered Nanga Parbat peak is one of nature’s alluring masterworks and is a popular destination for the adventurous voyagers.
A Pakistani Sunni militant group Jundullah, who has waged a series of attacks on Shia Muslim minority in northern Pakistan, has claimed the responsibility for the attack.
“These foreigners are our enemies and we proudly claim responsibility for killing them and will continue such attacks in the future as well,” Jundullah spokesman Ahmed Marwat told Reuters by telephone.
The same terrorist outfit was found involved in a number of attacks on the Shia dominant bordering country Iran.
Police said that the attack on the tourists took place about 1am on Sunday and the assistants fled the scene. The dead bodies were shifted to the DHQ Hospital.
Frontier Constabulary Northern areas have taken the control of area following the killings.
President Asif Ali Zardari, Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif, MQM chief Altaf Hussain and several other political and religious figures have strongly condemned the attack on tourists.
